


Search for the Stones

by QueanBysshe



Category: Doctor Strange (2016), Invader Zim, Marvel Cinematic Universe, Men in Black (Movies)
Genre: Alien Biology, Alien Cultural Differences, Alien Pregnancy, Aliens, Canon is more like guidelines than actual rules, Crossover, Enemies to Friends, Eusocial Irkens, Gen, Infinity Stones, Pre-Infinity War
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-01-28
Updated: 2019-02-26
Packaged: 2019-10-18 05:10:51
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 9,017
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17574515
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/QueanBysshe/pseuds/QueanBysshe
Summary: AU of Infinity War. Strange does research on his own, poking his nose everywhere, for the Infinity Stones; he accidentally stumbles on someone else who appears to be doing the same thing, but more successfully. An impulsive two-am email leads to a meeting with a ufologist who doesn't seem quite as wildly speculative as the rest, and is concealing a great deal.





	1. The Email

**Author's Note:**

> I honestly have no idea where this is going, I just started writing and got a crazy idea; so come along with me for the ride and we'll find out together.

Stephen Strange was not a mystical person, but recent events compelled him to research rumours, myths, legends, anything that might lead to an Infinity Stone. There were more, more like the Eye, and they were dangerous if they weren’t accounted for.

He went to the site of Grand Central Station, on a whim, and had felt the power there, the familiar feel of it. He found himself looking through news footage, camera footage, anything on Loki’s invasion of Midtown, a few years ago. When he realised Loki had an Infinity stone, one of the half dozen littering the universe, he felt strangely calm, and opened the tiny notepad file where he kept the information, typing ‘Sceptre – Loki’ into it, then hiding it in a decoy folder because it never hurt to be prepared. Writing it was… not an option. He could write, but the pain that simple act caused made him so angry that he usually just typed, nowadays.

So that was two accounted for. Out of… five or six, or maybe seven? Somewhere around there, was what his research had uncovered.

Three weeks later, he found a lead and sent a message to the Wakandan Embassy, politely inquiring if there was historical information on an artefact called or legend about the Tear of Thoth. The letter he received back was that there was such a legend, and that there had been much written about it, but little known, as it was always spoken of metaphorically. He was welcome to see the documents attached, which was everything about the Tear that had ever been found. Strange sent them back a polite thank you letter and started digging in. By the end of it, he was fairly certain the Tear was a Stone, but had no clue where it was, or who had it.

Scraping the bottom of the internet yielded more nonsense, but Strange found a surprisingly sane ufologist right when he was about to give up on trying to get any _real_ information on aliens. He was intense, a little frenetic, but analysed the footage with far less jumping to conclusions than his peers. The most relevant part of his essay, the one that truly _alarmed_ Strange, was pointing out that Loki must have had _two_ very powerful items, not just the one: the sceptre, which was clearly powered by one of the Infinity Stones (not that this ufologist knew of the Infinity Stones), and the cube that Thor had taken back to Asgard. Where was the sceptre?

_Cube – Thor_

_Sceptre – Loki?_

_Tear – Lost? On Earth?_

_Eye – Strange_

That was four. Where were the others? What did they _do_ , exactly? Strange wanted to know, and he wanted, moreover, to actually talk to someone about this, someone new. Wong had been a great help to him, but agreed that a new perspective was always helpful when searching for a needle in a haystack.

Maybe because it was two am, he didn’t have a fully-functioning frontal lobe. He emailed the ufologist, went to bed, promptly forgot about it, until he got an email a week later.

_If you’re serious, and I mean really serious, about this, then we can talk. But I’ve been baited before, and I’m not about to release anything I say to you._

Attached was an extensive contract that basically said that their communications, all of them, were confidential and that Strange had to agree to be legally bound to silence on what they talked about. There was a PO box, and Strange took the contract to his lawyer, who told him, with a shrug, that it wasn’t anything fishy, it bound the ufologist to secrecy as well as Strange, so this person was just covering their ass, which wasn’t too paranoid in this day and age.

Strange figured he was in it, and it couldn’t _hurt_ , and anyway… he was curious. Membrane—if that was his real name, which it seemed like it was, and Strange could respect someone who had been saddled with a last name ripe for mockery—had been on an even keel so far, and had given Strange information he sorely needed, and a new eye on information he himself had gone over, and missed putting together. Along with the signed notarised contract, Strange sent along a business card, and the hours he was willing to answer his phone.

He got a call the next day, at ten in the morning, from a number with a 714 area code. ‘Hello, Stephen Strange speaking.’

_‘It’s Membrane. You had questions about my essay on Loki.’_

Strange smiled, already feeling the old academic glee of collaborative discussion. He wasn’t about to tell the man about the Eye, of course, but he put his feet up on the sofa and settled in for a long discussion, glad he had a headset. ‘I went over that footage for days and didn’t see what you did. It’s… alarming, what you’ve uncovered.’

_‘Yeah,’_ came the grim reply. _‘You don’t know the half of it.’_

‘Tell me, then,’ Strange invited. There was silence on the other end of the phone, then, suspiciously,

_‘What do you think the sceptre and the box really are?’_

‘I think they’re both powered by the same type of item,’ Strange said, purposely using the word that Membrane had. It was a good word, one of the reasons Strange had read on, was that very careful wording, the way Membrane did not wildly speculate, merely stick to the data. Properly scientific methods. ‘I think that an item that powerful is something to be concerned about, especially in the hands of those willing and able to do harm.’

_‘There was an incident in New Mexico, the one with Thor’s first arrival. I’ve been to the site where he touched down, it’s still messed up, with that pattern still burned into the sublayers of soil. And Foster’s research is opaque, despite everything. It’s not off-topic, it’s a point: if something that **isn’t** one of those items is capable of something like that, then these items are worrying. I’ve seen a lot of things that scare me, but the… the sheer **scale** of those items is terrifying.’_

‘Agreed,’ Strange said, curious. ‘What makes you so level-headed?’

A bitter laugh _. ‘I’d sound crazy if I told you, but let’s just say that actually seeing some shit sobers you right the fuck up. My dad was a scientist, worked on some pretty weird shit. It’s not fun when you actually know about it.’_

Strange contemplated using the term ‘mood’, but it didn’t taste right on his tongue, so he merely said, ‘Agreed,’ again.

_‘You’re researching the items, aren’t you?’_

‘I might be,’ Strange allowed. ‘Surely you understand my caution.’

_‘Yeah, I do. Listen, I’m gonna be passing through the city soon, you wanna meet up, talk in person somewhere? Wednesday afternoon?’_

Oh, that was much preferable, yes. Strange liked meeting people on his own territory. He told Membrane to meet him at a tea shop near the Sanctum, one that he and Wong frequented. It was just noisy enough there to have a truly private conversation, and there was an actual bathroom, which was a wise decision for a tea shop with tea as good as Elixir served. The clientele were… well, the Sanctum was at the end of the Village, and the tea shop was run by someone whose gender was constantly a giant question mark, that said enough. He even gave Membrane the train station to get to, because the Village was _not_ on the grid, it was the part of the city that was a tangle of diagonals and narrow one-ways, and a nightmare if you didn’t know where you were going.

Strange wasn’t sure what he’d get out of this meeting, but at worst it would be nothing; at best, it would be a lead, perhaps even an agent to help him sift through information to find more leads.

But first, tea.


	2. The Tea

Membrane blended into the general baseline of New York well, in his all black and his undercut, looking like he hadn’t slept in days and hadn’t seen the sun in years. The trenchcoat was well-worn, the glasses were narrow little things, Strange saw them most on tech types who wanted to look like cool nerds. He seemed like he was at home in a city, in a crowd, and didn’t flutter an eye at Elixir. They were of a kind, Strange supposed—he was no shakes at fashion, but Elixir had fangs, and wore an ever-shifting collection of contacts that were designed to spook people, which meant, surely, that Elixir was some sort of goth. Membrane wore black, and well, it might have just been black, except the trenchcoat looked well-worn, and the man was from Southern California, where it rarely dipped into sweater weather.

‘Is that him?’ Wong asked, and Strange nodded, standing up and coming to meet him. The tea shop—and the Sanctum’s proximity to the Village—meant that Strange could actually wear the Cloak here, and nobody thought it was odd. He wore a much more casual, understated outfit beneath it, though. There was no need for all the gathered layers and monk-like dangling ropes, that was too… costumey, for a casual meet-up with someone. The Cloak, however, was insistent on coming along, and Strange didn’t mind.

‘Mr Membrane?’ he asked, meeting the man at the pick-up counter, where he was leaning.

‘Mr Strange?’

‘Doctor, actually,’ Strange corrected.

‘Doctor of what?’

‘Brain surgery,’ the drag queen waiting next to them said, smiling at Strange. Strange smiled back politely.

‘How are you, Madam?’ He’d addressed one of the drag queens that way once, unsure how to be polite, and it had delighted them; he had kept doing it not simply to make them smile (he’d never much cared about charm) but because they hadn’t ever explained an alternative.

She picked up her tea. ‘Oh, you know, life in the big city.’ She winked at Membrane. ‘See you round, Neo.’

Membrane rolled his eyes at the reference, obviously it wasn’t the first time; but she only laughed and went back to her table. He took his tea tray and followed Strange back to the table, sitting down across from them in the booth.

‘This is Wong,’ Strange said, and Wong bowed rather than shake hands. Membrane bowed his head back, briefly, before those sharp brown eyes looked at Strange again.

‘You realise Thor isn’t the first alien to come to Earth?’

‘Hell of an opener.’

‘I only say that kind of thing in person,’ Membrane said, folding his arms. ‘You know how hard it is to talk _seriously_ about aliens to people?’

‘I have something of an idea, after my research,’ Strange said, sipping his tea. ‘But I’m only interested in the Items.’

‘You and him both,’ Membrane said, pouring his tea into the mug. ‘Listen, there’s someone actively looking for them. An alien. I keep hearing his name on the feeds I monitor.’

Strange raised a brow. ‘Feeds.’

Membrane just gave him a hard stare.

‘Right,’ Strange said, ‘What are the Items being called?’

‘Stones,’ Membrane said. ‘Infinity Stones. And I know where one is.’

It was Strange’s turn to hard stare. Membrane gave a crooked grin.

‘You think I didn’t research you before coming here? That I didn’t know what happened here? You’ve got one of the stones, and you’re either looking for more or just want to keep track of them. I’m not getting a megalomaniac vibe from you, so I’m guessing you’re like me, you just want to know who has the other ones.’

‘And you would know about megalomaniac vibes at a glance?’

Membrane laughed. ‘Oh man, you have _no_ idea what I had to deal with in school. Hoooo boy.’ He tested his tea with a fingertip, but didn’t drink it yet. ‘Like I said, Thor isn’t the first alien that’s come here. I know for certain at least one other arrived in ’01. Quietly. And _he_ knows about the Stones by now, which is…’ He tilted his head. ‘Ehh, _slightly_ concerning?’

‘Only slightly?’

‘He’s a weird, uh, hm, how do I even describe him?’ Membrane muttered, testing his tea again. He took a very cautious sip, put the cup back down, looking around the shop, at all the hanging lanterns, the art on the walls, the back shelf of teapots and cups, the customers… he narrowed his eyes suddenly. ‘No,’ he said, softly. Strange and Wong both looked where he was looking, to see a slim, androgynous, very well made-up, spindly person walking into the shop, walking like going to get tea was a life or death situation. They were wearing a very haute-couture backpack with their form-fitting black and red.

‘Who is that?’ Strange murmured. The answer he got from Membrane was so simmering with old animosity that it almost sounded like a _sexual_ hiss.

‘ _Zim_.’


	3. The Alien

Zim was used to crowds by now, used to doing makeup on all of his exposed body, used to the wig. Over the years, he’d adapted, learned better techniques, that could be endured in all of Earth’s ever-desertifying weather, that could be worn longer, that looked more natural, more human. Humans themselves helped, and Zim felt… safer around the kind of humans in this tea shop, because he blended better with humans the more covered in cosmetics the humans were. Drag Queens were the best ones, and Zim fielded compliments on his hair and his makeup as he wended through full tables and up to the counter.

‘Girl, that wig is fierce!’

‘Thank you.’

‘I love your contour, honey.’

‘Thank you.’

‘Nice contacts,’ said the human behind he counter, who had on ones that made their eyes a beautiful red, and fangs. ‘You want a pot of tea, or just a cup?’

‘Pot, please,’ Zim said, giving exact change, as always. He knew Dib was here, had followed him here, had followed his research for years. At first, it had been as an enemy—now, however, Zim was genuinely worried. The Empire was in danger, and he wasn’t at all sure if the Empire really knew that. This galaxy was so out of the way, and his youthful arrogance and failures had cost him the trust of his Tallest. Humans were… perhaps superior, when it came to understanding the importance of experience before deployment.

He turned his head just enough to see Dib, sitting in a booth with two others, one of whom had an energy reading that reset the meter to zero, it was so high. The other one was still more than any human had any business being. Dib glared at him. Zim grinned back.

‘Dib!’ he said, like they were old friends, and slid into the booth next to him, trapping him, invading his personal space, not at all worried about showing his teeth, or his tongue. Dib _knew_ , it was actually, at this point, _comforting_. ‘How nice to see a familiar face in the crowd. Introduce me to your friends.’

‘No,’ Dib growled, shoving him away. Zim had expected that, however, and wasn’t pushed far, but sat at a more polite distance.

‘Stephen Strange,’ the one in the cape said, sipping his tea.

‘Wong,’ said the other, laconically.

‘Dib and I went to school together,’ Zim said brightly, in a throaty voice that had a crack in it. ‘Did he tell you? Ever since fourth grade, we’ve been _mortal_. Enemies.’

‘Zee!’ called Elixir, from the pick-up counter.

‘Excuse me,’ Zim said politely, and left them.

‘That’s the alien that got here before Thor,’ Membrane muttered. ‘God. _God_. He’s _following_ me now. Wonderful.’ He dragged his hands through his hair. ‘Anyway,’ he said, ‘like I said, alien trying to find the stones is being called…’ he trailed off, glancing over at Zim, who was talking to Elixir at the counter. He leaned forward, lowered his voice almost to inaudible. ‘The Collector.’

Zim didn’t return to their table, and Strange tossed a silencing ward on the booth. Noise around them dimmed, and Membrane raised a brow at him.

‘Now he can’t eavesdrop. You were saying?’ Strange prompted. ‘The Collector? That’s it?’

‘Yeah, he seems to have a museum somewhere, I can’t figure out where. He collects… stuff. Valuable stuff? One of a kind stuff, I know that much.’ Membrane’s eyes widened. ‘Shit, he _bumped into me_.’ He started running his hands over himself.

‘There’s no bug,’ Strange said, surprised that he wasn’t bored. It seemed Membrane’s slight paranoia was entirely warranted, if an alien was following him around, had been since he was ten. ‘Believe me, we would have noticed.’

‘How? It’s alien tech.’

Strange glanced at Wong, who gave the smallest of nods, and spoke.

‘We are mutants,’ he said, which surprised Strange.

‘Bullshit,’ Membrane said. Wong shrugged.

‘It was worth a try,’ he said. ‘That is usually easier to believe than magic.’

‘Magic almost sounds wholesome, at this point in my career,’ Membrane said with a little huff of a laugh, taking another careful sip of tea, then a bigger one; evidently, it had finally reached the right temperature. ‘Okay, so the stones are magic.’

‘For lack of a better word,’ Strange said, still not liking it. ‘So far, we know that one of the Stones controls time.’

‘I have theories about the cube,’ Membrane said, wrapping his hands around the handle-less mug. ‘And you gave me the missing piece of information. The Stones control things, like, elements? Or whatever you want to call it, I guess. So the cube or the sceptre controls… travel? Call it, I don’t know, Space.’ He got out a notebook and started writing on a blank page.

_Strange – Time_

_Cube or Scepter – Space_

_Cube or Scepter – ?_

Strange looked at the list, contemplating; but Wong made the decision to take the notebook. ‘May I?’ he asked, and Membrane gave him the pen. He added,

 __ ~~Strange~~ – Time  
Eye of Agamotto  
Cube ~~or Scepter~~ – Space

_~~Cube or~~ Scepter – ? _

_Tear of Thoth – ?_

He turned the notebook, and gave Membrane back the pen. ‘ _That_ is what we know,’ he said, with a little nod. ‘Now we are caught up.’

Membrane considered the list. ‘I’ve heard of the Tear,’ he said, slowly, tapping the words with his pen, ‘It’s a lost artefact from Ancient Egypt.’

‘Lost being the key word,’ Strange said. ‘Last known location in Wakanda, and even they don’t know where it is.’

‘So, it _could_ be on earth.’

‘But it _could_ be anywhere.’

‘Why don’t we include your mortal enemy?’ Wong asked, with his usual sudden almost-cheerfulness. Almost. It was more brisk than anything, really. ‘You said it was only slightly concerning. You don’t fear him.’

‘He’s been here seventeen years and the worst he did was take over the school a couple of times, for a minute. By junior high he kinda… stopped trying? Idunno, I kind of… feel sorry for him, sometimes.’ Membrane, looked at his tea for a while. ‘I might have overhead a transmission to his superiors, once or twice. They, uh… they didn’t seem like they… wanted to hear from him. Ever again.’

‘We have a common enemy,’ Strange pointed out, ‘This Collector doesn’t sound like a _benign_ entity. We should ally with Zim—before someone else does.’

‘If he has stopped trying to harm, then it makes sense to offer him a chance to _help._ He lives here now, for better or worse,’ Wong said, pouring himself more tea. ‘An immigrant, like the rest of us.’

‘Yeah,’ Membrane said, sullen and reluctant, almost whiny as he leaned back. ‘God, you have no idea how _annoying_ he is, though….’

Wong was pushing at Strange to let him up, and Strange obliged.

‘I’ll go talk to him,’ Wong said, ambling over, holding his teacup.


	4. The Détente

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Two enemies think on one another.

Dib glanced over at Zim, sitting and drinking his tea, and was more annoyed that Zim was _not_ being his usual overdramatic self, not proving Dib right. But then again… he’d gone pretty quiet, in Junior High. And in High School he’d suddenly started looking more human, but also more… well, pretty, because of his alien features. The makeup didn’t help, not that Zim could _not_ wear makeup. Also, Zim was small—he’d grown, but he’d still be the smallest in the class, and Dib had never stopped to think about how that had changed his personality. When they were all the same size, roughly, Zim had been more confident; now, he was… well, quiet. Scared. Jesus, he was _scared_. Dib didn’t like thinking about that. Maybe he was following Dib because a mortal enemy was still the person that had never stuffed him into a locker, was… the closest thing he had to companionship, at this point.

And, Christ, wasn’t Membrane the same? He had no friends either, and his animosity with Zim was the only constant in his life, really. His sister had sunk into professional game testing, disappeared off to Canada to be used up and burned out by Bioware or Blizzard, and they’d always been enemies anyway. Enemies were all Dib had.

_We’ve been **mortal.** Enemies._

He’d said it like he was proud, like he _respected_ Dib. And isn’t that what their relationship was built on? Respecting each other as a serious threat? No one _else_ in their lives really did that, had done that. Ever.

Dib took off his glasses so he could scrub at his face in frustration, groaning. Strange just raised a brow at him.

‘I didn’t expect to have a fucking _existential crisis_ …’ Dib said, into his folded arms.

‘That tends to happen, around sorcerers,’ Strange said, with a dry humour, pouring him more tea.

.oOo.

Zim watched the human, Wong, warily, but he just sat down, and sipped his tea.

‘He…llo?’ Zim said, warily, as he kept stirring sugar into his tea. He’d removed the tea almost immediately, and taken an entire sugar canister to his table, working on slowly pouring the entire contents into the hot water, stirring slowly, so as not to make the maddening clinking noises that made his antennae twitch. Metal spoons with porcelain vessels… humans were _completely_ deaf, Zim was fairly sure.

‘Hello,’ said the human, and sipped his own drink.

‘Are you… are you going to say anything?’ Zim asked.

‘Do you want me to?’

Zim considered this, adding more sugar to the water. ‘What do you want?’

‘What do _you_ want? You followed him all the way here.’

‘I—yes,’ Zim admitted. ‘I _might_ have.’

‘You care about him?’

Zim would have recoiled at that question, years ago, would have been _offended_ , that he, a scion of the Empire, would care a whit about a pathetic, soft-skinned worm like Dib. That was before Earth had started, well, getting to him. His rations had run out quickly, and the synthesiser had finally worn out after a few years, which was saying something, because a Voot’s synthesiser wasn’t supposed to last so long doing so much with so little. He’d had to resort to Earth food, which wasn’t so bad once he started actually _shopping_ for it, found the fresh food didn’t make him recoil as much in horror.

Found the beautiful, wonderful plants that Earth grew, the array of sweet, delicious _fruit_ , and the _sugar cane_ , and the _honey_ , best of all the honey. Zim had _lived_ on honey.

And he’d _grown taller_ , that was the shocking thing. He was full-grown, he wasn’t supposed to get to Tallest height! He was an invader, a Smallest. Yet he’d grown as fast as the humans around him, tall and beautiful, and though he’d slowed down after the initial spurt, he was _still heightening,_ and had no idea when he’d stop.

This good news had at first heartened him—but then it had quickly soured with fear. He wasn’t _supposed_ to be a Tallest, and his Pak couldn’t adjust well to it, he’d had to start illegally tinkering, and cutting himself off from the Empire’s updates to the programming. It had caused… some alarming results, results that he didn’t want to think too hard about; but when you’re stuffed into a locker for several hours, you have nothing to do _but_ think.

He’d been a Smallest. With time and food found on a foreign planet, food that tasted good, food he craved more and more of, he’d _grown_ , and moreover, had stopped being affected by so much, stopped being so… delicate. Water didn’t burn, nor did the scents in the air overwhelm him, even here, in the middle of a city. In other words, he’d shown every sign of recovering from chronic malnutrition.

He finally emptied the sugar canister entirely, and set it down, still stirring carefully. There was a clink, and his eye twitched slightly at the sound, in reflex. But there were no more, he made sure of it, and replaced the lid, pouring the tea into the cup and letting it cool, still thinking.

He’d grown, and had too much to think about, and too many _more_ enemies to dodge. Humans were terrifying, when they turned their minds to violence. There’d even been a day where a weapon had been brought by one of the ones that terrorised him and many others, and Zim’s Pak had recognised the weapon. It had been easy to quietly render it useless, until it was pointed at the wielder and went off. That day, only one person—the one who had brought the gun—had gone to the medics (with a bloodied foot), and everyone still talked about how lucky they’d all been.

Zim hadn’t ever let on he was the reason the gun malfunctioned, hadn’t done it for anyone, hadn’t really even been aware of the growing issue of violence among the humans of this place; his Pak had simply been scanning for threats, and protecting its owner.

That human threat didn’t return to the school, but there were more to take his place, and they all counted Zim one of their targets. He couldn’t do much about it, he realised that quickly—it had to do with how he looked—too thin, too small, too graceful.... He tried dressing differently, but it didn’t help enough for him to suffer the heavy coarseness of the clothing. He went back to the soft leggings and shirts he’d been wearing, bought from the section of the stores with all the smiling humans with the lactation glands, who had softer, smaller clothing, in more pleasing colours (not that Zim ever dared wear colours other than Dominax red and black).

With the enemies he made, Zim also found friends—well, humans trying to be friend _ly_ , anyway. Other humans who wore makeup, were too thin, were too fat, were too weird... they were all targets for the same humans who targeted Zim. Zim had gone along with them when they’d invited him to sit with them, lonely. Irkens weren’t supposed to get lonely—but they were also usually surrounded by other Irkens. Being Taller had made Zim a little more willing to break rules, and he’d sat with these humans, allowed them close, allowed himself to listen to them, give him advice on getting along better with other humans.

The Tallest had begun to not answer his transmissions, around the same time, driving him closer to the humans as his mind began to, finally, begin to work more clearly. He was not being tested. He was exiled. He did what anyone would do, and began to try and find solace here, which necessitated breaking down his self-imposed walls of superior distance and coldness. There were no worthy companions, they had discarded him; so, he being unworthy, he would… be allowed to have unworthy, _alien_ companions. Not many. Not too close. Dominax, after all, did not really have friends, and if he was Taller, then well, he was properly a Dominax, wasn’t he? Of course he was, he had red eyes, didn’t he? He was Dominax. Nevermind that he wasn’t in combat anymore, nevermind that he was using more brain-skills than body-skills. He had red eyes. He was Dominax.

He finally sipped his tea, and it was good, very good. Not as good as honey, but nothing was as good as honey. His antennae, poor things, tried to wiggle, only to be thwarted by the tape keeping them still. Humans didn’t wiggle antennae when they were pleased. They smiled, or closed their eyes, or redirected their blood to their faces. Zim closed his eyes, that was the most comfortable thing to do, especially with the newer contacts allowing the motion without much protest.

‘Okay,’ said the human, getting up. ‘That is enough time. Come back to sit with us.’

Zim didn’t really contemplate _not_ going along, taking his teapot and cup along, leaving the empty sugar canister, the spoon, the tray. He paused as the cloaked human got up to let Wong in, but slipped into the booth next to Wong afterwards, forcing the cloaked human to sit next to Dib. There were times when bothering Dib would be entertaining, and times when… well, when he wished Dib weren’t so simple-minded. Maybe with two other humans around, Dib would show a little restraint. Really, how long had it been since they’d really talked? Zim reviewed the data in his Pak and realised it had turned into years.

He glanced down at the notepad on the table, and knew instantly the subject at hand, and what chits he had to put into play, what advantages he could dangle. When had he started thinking like an Intellixar?

‘Dib,’ he said, pleasantly, sipping his sugar water, feeling better for it. ‘Strange.’ Everyone here had a good name, a monosyllabic name.

‘Infinity Stones,’ Strange said shortly. ‘Are you looking for them?’

‘I wouldn’t tell you if I were.’

‘If you aren’t, you’re careless,’ Strange countered. Zim drew back, slightly, and glared, sipping his liquid sugar as he thought on how to reply. Intellixar _bastard_. (He wasn’t sure what a bastard was, precisely, but humans could express rage so _well_ with words)

‘I’m monitoring,’ Zim admitted, truthfully, pouring more from his teapot.

‘Is that—is that even tea? Zim, you’re supposed to leave the teabag—’

‘I know how to make _tea_ , Dib,’ Zim interrupted, surprised he hadn’t resorted to yelling or insults, yet; but maybe it was because he hadn’t really spoken to humans that way in a long time. ‘I don’t like tea, I ordered it to be polite.’

Dib narrowed his eyes slightly, in confusion. ‘To… be polite?’

‘Yes, perhaps you’ve heard of it.’ He took a sip. This being calm thing really _was_ more fun, he realised, as he watched Dib’s expression—was able to read it, after this long being here.

‘Do you know anything about the Collector?’ Strange asked.

‘I’ve plotted Knowhere.’

Strange hummed, refilling his own teacup and thinking. Dib had other concerns.

‘When did you learn how to be _polite_ , Zim?’

‘It’s called adolescence,’ Zim deadpanned.

‘You didn’t— _have_ —an ado—wait, did you? Did they send you here _as a kid_?’

‘No!’ Zim said, ‘don’t be _silly_ ,’ he added, his voice dropping an octave on the last word. He blinked in surprise. His Irken lilt hadn’t come out in years.

‘So, you _were_ full-grown when we were in fourth grade?’ But it was more of a question than perhaps Dib intended it to be. ‘You’re like, twice that height now. What _happened_? Are your people like snakes, do you just—keep growing forever?’

Zim felt… inclined to share his own confusion, but he quashed the thought. ‘You _do_ have something the Collector wants. What’s to stop me from using that information to the advantage of the Empire?’

‘Your _Empire_ hasn’t spoken to you in years,’ Dib said, and immediately regretted it, because Zim didn’t angry, didn’t deny it—he merely looked _sad_ , down at his teacup, his voice getting that soft, broken tone of someone trying not to cry.

‘It was worth a try,’ he said, which was worse than if he’d just agreed, Dib thought.

‘Jesus, what happened to you?’

‘High School.’

‘Seriously, stop with the jokes.’

‘Humour is a healthy coping mechanism,’ Zim said primly. ‘Which is something I learned from my friends.’

‘You have friends?’

‘Well, I don’t make my _own_ wigs.’

Dib actually laughed, at that, surprised. ‘I can’t believe this. You’re… _civil.’_

‘Humans are more inclined to obey, when one is civil.’

‘If you two are quite finished flirting,’ Strange said, feeling rather like he was babysitting children. ‘We need to talk resources.’

‘He’s got a ship,’ Membrane said immediately.

‘None of us would fit inside it, let alone all of us!’ Zim snapped, because it was frustrating, and Earth lacked the materials to modify the Cruiser to fit his new size—at least, lacked _accessible_ materials. Stark Industries might have something useful, given the Iron Man suit, but Zim had no way of _accessing_ those materials. He looked away and busied himself pouring the last of his tea, just as Elixir swanned over, holding a jar. It was set in front of Zim, as Elixir took his empty teapot.

‘If you wanted honey, cupcake, you should have said so.’ Elixir purred, winking at him.

Zim looked at the jar of honey—it was an entire quart jar of it—and glanced up at Elixir. ‘I can’t pay for this.’

‘On the house, my sugar,’ came the reply. ‘Welcome to New York.’

Zim’s hands were actually trembling as he reached for the jar, sliding it over to hold it close, like something precious. ‘Thank you.’

‘No trouble, darling.’

Zim watched Elixir go, and his Pak informed him, from the DNA sample on the jar, that this was not a human, was someone doing a very good job of mimicking one—so good that Elixir could toy with gender presentation. Zim held his jar of honey close, and felt slightly less alone. It was the first time anyone had ever clocked him without being hostile; it was, actually, the first time anyone that wasn’t human had clocked him. Who was this? It was futile to try and find a species—this galaxy didn’t fit any known species in the Pak.

‘What do you mean, plotting nowhere?’ Dib said, snapping the conversation back to the point.

‘Knowhere,’ Zim said, in too good a mood to call Dib stupid. ‘It’s a colony the Collector owns, where his museum is. Entrance fee is a million dollars—even if you have something to sell.’

‘Is there any way to get there using magic?’ Strange asked Wong, who contemplated.

‘Perhaps, if we had the exact location. It’s never been done before.’ Wong looked at Zim, and said, with a certain compassion in his laconic tones. ‘Are you in?’

Zim considered it, and got up. ‘Take us to your place,’ he told Strange, with a hint of imperiousness in his tones, marred only slightly by how protectively he was cradling the enormous jar of honey. ‘There, per _haps_ I will share what I have.’

He was doing it again, Zim listened to his old accent, and it was—it was awful, really, but also comforting even so. He’d nearly lapsed into Irken pronouns, which came out of the translation into English as speaking in third-person. As they left the tea shop, Zim fell into the fast pace of the streets, wending through single file with no hesitation. Dib was only slightly less graceful, but watched Zim from behind carefully. Even though it was a warm day, it was shaded on streetlevel, especially here, and the humidity trapped all the smells of hot food, garbage, and whatever blasts of air came up from underground vents.

Dib reflected on how it differed from LA. It wasn’t as dusty, the filth was distinctly _wet_ , and instead of dumpsters, there were literal piles of garbage bags. Pigeons were everywhere, but so were other birds—weird speckled birds, smaller than crows but larger than sparrows, that gave it kind of a wild feeling, and the tea shop was across from a very small park with very old, very green trees. Weird.

The crosswalk was diagonal, and that was weird too, as well as all the narrow streets, and the sheer _age_ of the buildings that were in disrepair and neglect. Any building that old would be a Historical Site, in LA. Or it would have been bulldozed and turned into something else by now. Strange led them up some steps, and into what looked like a huge old library. And it was blissfully quiet, once the doors closed.

‘Is there somewhere I can change?’ Zim asked, in the silence.

‘Along the left side of the main staircase, second door on your right,’ Wong said, with kindness that Strange didn’t recognise. Zim bowed to him, stiffly but with respect, and went.

‘…He’s _different,_ ’ Dib said, after he heard a door open and close. ‘I didn’t expect it to be that easy.’

‘Civility makes people more inclined to do what you want,’ Wong said, with the faintest hint of a smile in his eyes.


	5. The Black and Purple

Zim came out green and pink-eyed, and with antennae. It was still startling, even though it wasn’t, for Dib to see him as himself. He was rubbing his eye with a gloved hand, which was almost endearing.

‘Hey, uh, what happened to Gir?’

‘I had to use him for parts when something broke,’ Zim said, totally missing the look of horror on Dib’s face as he walked by.

‘But he… was a person.’

‘He was a robot, Dib.’

‘He was intelligent!’

Zim just _stared_ at him for a few minutes, in shock. Dib rethought that.

‘Okay, he wasn’t _intelligent_ , but he had a personality!’

Zim managed to roll his eyes, even though there was no visible pupil or sclera. ‘ _Fuck’s_ sake,’ he muttered, and looked around for Strange, who was sitting in a chair near a fireplace. Zim liked fireplaces. The idea that humans still liked something so primitive as fire, enough to go to great lengths just to have it in their home, was fascinating. Zim supposed there _was_ something about fire that was… invitingly sense-making.

‘The Collector isn’t the problem,’ Zim said to Strange, crossing his legs as he sat opposite him, steepling his fingers. ‘ _Thanos_ is the one threatening the _universe_. That means that we have a _common_. Enemy.’ And there he went again. Oh well. Zim just resigned himself to Dib causing his old cadence to come back.

As Dib came over, hopping up on the sofa nearby, he reflected that, really, Zim had the air of a proper Bond Villain. It was… it shouldn’t be so attractive; but, he had to admit, it really was, now that Zim was taller, and… calmer. ‘The _entire_ universe?’ he said, a little sceptical that anyone could threaten the entire universe, even with those Stones.

‘Each stone controls an entire _concept_ , as far as I can surmise from mine,’ Strange told them both. Zim actually hopped up on the chair, pointing in triumph to the amulet.

‘Ha _ha!_ I knew it! You _do_ have one!’ He was grinning widely, almost maniacally. After a marked silence, his antennae fell slightly and he got back down to sit, clearing his throat. ‘So,’ he said, ‘which one is it?’

‘Time,’ Strange said. Dib winced. Messing with time had always freaked him out.

‘I know that one is called the Aether, and belongs to… elves?’ Zim went on.

‘What?’ Dib said. ‘ _Elves?_ Elves aren’t ali—well, wait, there’s the Nordics, but… _seriously?_ Elves?’

Zim shrugged. ‘The Aether seems to control Illusions, or Perception. My observations of the tesseract—and its name—indicate it controls Space.’

‘These are. Way too powerful,’ Dib said. ‘Is anyone a little freaked out? Because I? I am a little freaked out right now.’

‘It’s… concerning,’ Strange agreed. ‘What can we do, exactly? What are our resources? Can you contact your people at all?’

‘No,’ Zim said, softly. ‘They wouldn’t believe me _or_ any of you. But I still have to save them from this… Thanos.’

‘Why does the Collector want them?’ Strange asked.

‘For his museum,’ Zim and Dib said at the same time, and paused, as people do when they accidentally do such things, and looked at one another.

‘Jinx, you owe me a soda,’ Zim said, and Dib laughed.

‘How old _are_ you?’ Strange asked, annoyed at their childish bickering already. ‘Both of you?’

‘Twenty-six,’ Dib said.

‘Six hundred and eighty-four,’ Zim said.

‘Holy _shit_ , seriously?’

‘You keep saying that,’ Zim said, turning to look at him, bouncing his foot.

‘It would seem safer to go to Knowhere, either way,’ Strange mused. ‘People who collect powerful things just to _have_ them are likely to want to show off their knowledge. We can use that to our advantage…’

Dib’s phone went off, and he excused himself going to answer it a little ways away. ‘Chaz?’

_‘Dib, get the fuck down here, something just crashed on my farm, and I’m racing the damn feds.’_

‘What! What was it?’

_‘Just get down here, man.’_

‘I’m in _Manhattan_ , Chaz. I can’t get dow—hang on a second.’ He put the phone on mute, and went over to Strange and Zim, who were going over the particulars of the plan. ‘Hey, uh, guys? There’s a downed alien ship at Chaz’s farm and I was wondering if uh, maybe we should go investigate? That? Right now?’

‘What _kind_ of alien ship?’ Zim asked, narrowing an eye.

‘I don’t _know_ , Zim, maybe we should go _find out_.’

‘Good idea. Follow me. Where is it?’ Strange said, already getting up and starting to cross over to the huge staircase. Zim and Dib followed, Dib put the phone back off mute.

‘Chaz, we’re coming. But uh, things are gonna be weird.’

_‘When are they not weird, Dib, I have a fucking **alien** in my **orchard**. That’s like, **seven trees** obliterated! I don’t know if I’m more excited about the alien or **pissed off** about the trees!’ _

‘Okay, Chaz, okay, just… hang on, I think we’re gonna be there soon.’

_‘You said you were in Manhattan.’_

‘Yeah,’ Dib said, as Strange led them down the hall and into a room with several doors in it. Dib knew what came next.

‘Where does your friend live, exactly?’

Dib set the phone on mute again. ‘Riverside. Do you need the address?’

‘No, I can’t get more specific than a city,’ Strange said, glowing lights wreathing his hands as he concentrated, seeming to move nothing in the air, but Dib felt _something_ shift, and Zim’s antennae _flattened_ , like they were trying to escape having to sense whatever it was. Strange opened one of the doors, and Dib recognised the street signs in view. It was alarmingly weird. Strange just went through the door.

‘Come on,’ he said, impatiently. Dib and Zim went, and the door shut behind them. Dib took a moment to pull up the maps in his phone, and realised they were in walking distance. He took over leading, walking quickly—Riverside wasn’t exactly a safe place to wander around at night.

There wasn’t any real indication anything had happened, even though there were sirens everywhere and something was definitely on fire. But Dib kept leading them to Chaz’s house, which was not where the fire was. Chaz’s house was down a little cul-de-sac, and had been built in the sixties. It wasn’t run-down, but Chaz wasn’t done fixing it up, either. Dib rang the bell—one of the few things Chaz _had_ fully restored, and it was a pleasant, _real_ chime, now. Chaz answered the door after a long pause, longer than it would have taken to get to the door; Dib knew Chaz was checking the door cameras—it paid to be paranoid in this town, given all the drugs. Dib waved.

‘Open the door, you paranoid fuck,’ he called through the door.

The door opened after much unlocking and unchaining. Dib knew it was reinforced, that was the first thing Chaz had done upon moving in.

Chaz eyed Strange, and Zim. ‘Oh,’ she said, looking at Zim. ‘You’ve got another one with you. Good.’ She let them in, shutting and locking the door. ‘Get in here, they’re, uh, they’re having an anxiety attack and locked themself in the bathroom.’

‘ _Another_ one?’ Dib was excited. Zim was less so.

‘How tall are they?’ he asked, cautiously. ‘Taller than me, or shorter?’

Chaz gave him a Look, but didn’t look at him the way Dib used to—still sort of did—and Zim liked her better for it. And, to her credit, she didn’t ask _why_ that was his first question. ‘They’re uh, _pretty_ tall. Like, could play for the NBA, easily.’

There was a scream. ‘Shit,’ Chaz said, and started for the hallway. Strange just waited, but Zim and Dib followed Chaz down the hall.

‘Dib, who the fuck is the cosplayer?’ Chaz asked, as she led them to her bedroom, digging around behind her pillows and finally pulling out a plastic storage bag of various weird candies, holding it up and twisting it this way and that, obviously looking for a specific candy.

‘Doctor Strange. He’s uh, he got us here.’

‘You’ll have to tell me about that later,’ she said, finally pulling a blue squeezy-pop from the bag.

Dib shuddered openly, but Zim put his hand on Chaz’s arm, holding out his other hand.

‘Give it to me,’ he asked. ‘Please. It’s been years since I’ve seen another Irken.’ He’d started out using that as a lie, but he realised it was painfully true—he would be happy for even the Almighty Tallest Red’s disdain.

Chaz slowly handed over the tube of high fructose corn syrup and blue dye number two.

‘Thank you,’ Zim said, and meant it. ‘It would be… helpful, if you went to the kitchen and made a solution of _distilled_ water and all of the sugar in your house, in a pot. Like tea.’

‘And that will calm your uh, your cousin down?’

‘It would help, yes. Do you have any produce?’

‘Do I—sugar, this is a _farm_.’

‘Excellent. Anything sweet?’

‘I have orange trees.’

‘Oh, _very_ excellent. If you can spare any, that would be even better than the water. _Don’t_ juice them, just let me come and peel them later.’

Zim went up to the bathroom door. ‘My Tallest!’ he called, ‘It is Zim!’ He wondered who it was. Fuchsia was prone to nerves, he was something of a pariah, though he was far more useful than Zim had ever been, and therefore not exiled.

When the door opened, slowly, Zim’s antennae fell instantly in submission, as they sensed exactly _who_ this was.

‘Zim?’ said Almighty Tallest Purple, in a shaky voice, looking starved and _sick_. Zim offered the candy tube.

‘For you, my Tallest,’ he said, softly, ‘There is better food in another room of this place, please excuse my humble offering.’

Purple reached out a shaking hand, and Zim realised he was _without his armour_. No wonder he looked smaller.

‘I—my Tallest, what happened? What brings you to the planet of exile?’ He figured it would do to admit he understood his position. He felt about as Small as he used to be, it was hard to remember he wasn’t. Purple was staring at him, even as he quickly emptied the candy tube of contents.

‘…You got _taller_.’

‘I… yes, My Tallest. Are you hurt?’ Tallest Purple’s other hand seemed burned, and Zim realised bathrooms were full of water. Water. Tallest Purple must have turned on the water.

‘I… _seem_ to have locked myself in a room full of _poison_. They’re barbarians, aren’t they?’

Zim thought on this, and decided he needed to make a point, or this would take a lot longer than it needed to. He went into the bathroom, not daring to touch Purple, and turned on the sink slowly, so it wouldn’t splash. Purple recoiled in horror, and Zim took off his glove, sticking his hand under the stream, and waiting. For a while the only sound was the water running, and then Purple’s voice.

‘You aren’t burning.’

‘No,’ Zim said, turning the water off and drying his hands. ‘I’m not.’ Tallest Purple was an Intellixar, he would reason through this faster than Zim had. ‘Are you still connected to the Pak Network?’

Tallest Purple _shivered_ , showing every sign of terror. ‘ _No.’_

Zim wondered, his mind brushing against an idea that was too scary to contemplate, just now. ‘Will you come with me, my Tallest?’

‘How did you get taller?’ Purple asked, but followed him, spiderlegs holding his weight. The gravity here would be such a difficult adjustment for Tallest Purple, Zim thought. Why wasn’t his hover unit working? Did it get damaged in the crash? Zim had so many questions.

The kitchen light was on, but it was dimmer than most humans preferred a kitchen to be, and Chaz was sitting at the table, a bowl of unpeeled oranges on the table. She was eating a slice of cake, a plastic container of strawberries beside her. She was stabbing a fork into the container, then eating a bite of the cake. A wineglass of milk was in front of her, and her legs were crossed as she sat sideways to the round aluminium table.

Zim pulled out the chair for Purple and pulled off his gloves, starting to peel the first orange.

‘Hi, hon,’ Chaz said to Purple. ‘Remember me?’

‘Yes,’ Purple said, warily eyeing the chair’s shiny vinyl upholstery, before gingerly having the spider legs lower him down on it, wincing when he finally settled, tried to retract them, didn’t. He took the first segment of orange, seeming encouraged that it didn’t burn, and ate it.

‘This is _better_ , why didn’t you offer me one of these things first?’

‘Didn’t have one in my pocket,’ Chaz said, as Zim handed another segment to Purple.

‘This is how. I got taller,’ Zim said to the purple-eyed Irken, which struck Chaz as a weird thing to say, but she just ate her cake and minded her business.

‘And you didn’t tell us?’

‘You had blocked me, by then,’ Zim said simply. ‘I couldn’t.’

Purple ate quietly through three oranges, and Chaz tried and failed not to think of the Very Hungry Caterpillar.

‘You got. _Taller_.’ Purple said. ‘Zim, you’re a pre-Tallest.’

‘I’m an exile, my Tallest.’ Zim was confident that Purple wouldn’t get his own oranges, continuing to peel them for him. ‘What brings you all the way out here?’

‘They were going to terminate me,’ Purple said grimly. ‘The Control Brains decided that was the best course of action. But… Red wouldn’t let it happen.’

‘Terminate you,’ Chaz said flatly. ‘You’re a _person_. What the hell would they wanna terminate you for?’

‘I… I don’t know,’ Purple said, and he looked so _lost_ that Chaz’s heart went out to him.

‘Okay, hon, well, you can stay here as long as you cooperate. It’s safer if you stay hidden, and that means listening to me about staying inside and away from the windows and doors, okay?’

There was the sound of a car pulling up outside, and Chaz got to her feet.

‘Like right now,’ she said. ‘You two, go back in the bedroom, okay? Stay _away_ from the windows, and stay _quiet_. Go. Now.’ She got up, still holding her fork, licking frosting off it as she went to answer the door.

‘Who is it?’ she sang sweetly.

‘Environmental Protection Agency, ma’am.’

Chaz checked the cameras inside the coat closet by the door, and narrowed her eyes. ‘Of _course_ you are,’ she muttered. ‘Meth lab’s the next street over!’ she called through the door, sweetly.

‘Yes ma’am, we’re going around to every house, need to measure some soil content due to the explosion, could you open this door?’

‘Like hell,’ Chaz muttered, and opened the door just enough for her to slip through, locking the door behind herself. Two black-suited agents, standard government issue. She was surprised that one was Latino, but not too surprised. They showed her their badges.

‘EPA, Division Six. This is Officer Hernandez, I’m Officer Manheim. May we come in, please.’

‘There’s no dirt inside the house,’ Chaz said, still saccharine, and gestured to the front yard, which was mostly cactus garden and the dry sandy dust that was Riverside soil. ‘But there’s plenty of dirt in the front yard, go on and take some.’

.s.S.s.

Dib was out into the backyard as soon as he heard the knock on the door; government knock, there was no mistaking it. Dib and Chaz used to do it to scare each other, as kids. Now, he followed Strange, who had gone into the backyard almost as soon as everyone else was distracted with the new alien. He’d never been near a _fresh_ crash site, and he knew the clock was ticking. Strange had glowing discs of strange light around his wrists and hands again, his fingers trembling but posed in particular ways.

The ship was definitely the same make as Zim’s stuff, that same bubbly shape; but this was a featureless ship, relatively—Irken ships (he had a _species name now!_ God, it had only taken _seventeen years_ ) were usually colourful, purples and magentas. This one was black and white—and it hadn’t gotten anything more than scratches on it. It was _usable_!

Dib peered into the front window, seeing the console, and the two pilot seats. ‘We could go to see the Collector, in this,’ Dib said to Strange.

‘I think we have more immediate problems.’

‘Where do we hide it? Yeah, it’s kinda big for Chaz’s garage…’ Dib said, ‘I wonder if it has a cloaking device.’

Strange tensed as the alarm spell he’d set went off, and there was a flash of bright white light from the direction of the house, and an unholy duotone screech-hiss that was not at all human.

_‘Fuck.’_ Dib started running for the house, Strange keeping pace, cloak billowing weirdly behind him.

**Author's Note:**

> If you want to talk more with me, come along over to [the land of Mel and Honey](https://discord.gg/R3HH5Br), my discord server!


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